"stylus" poems
The all seeing iris imperial city
The swiftest of stylus this side of the ‘sippi
The trippiest spittin’ Promethean hippy
Conspiracy theorist of eeriest verse
The despotic hypnotic black flag bearin’ Hearst
Still immersing myself in a poverty trap
As I grapple with lack of fact check cashing crap
Cryogenically frozen emotion vibes flowin’
From out my funk bunker boombox
Overthrowin’
Your global dominion opinion with ease
Shootin’ breezes with Tirailleurs Senegalese
I’m the kid wicked picket sign paintin’ Tom Sawyer
The ill eagle Taino privilege enjoyer
Still swoopin’ in mean on each **** I make clean
Pick the bones dry of serpentine oil green dreams
Then I bury what’s left of your money machines
With the pharaohs of old’s latest pyramid schemes
Jul 15, 2018
Jul 15, 2018 at 12:10 PM UTC
December,
the whole year,
actually,
has whittled my world
d
o
w
n
to a lap
cat
older than me
in fur years,
and this misnomered,
smartphone,
from which
I strain to shave marrow
from stolen bones
in the manner
of a single tooth
wolf.
Dec 16, 2011
Dec 16, 2011 at 9:53 AM UTC
I want to descent the well,
I want to climb the walls of Granada,
To gaze at the heart graved
By the dark stylus of waters.
The wounded child moaned
With a crown of frost.
Ponds, cisterns and fountains
Raised their swords in the air.
Ay what fury of love, what a wounding edge,
what nocturnal murmurs, what white deaths!
What deserts of light went destroying
the sand-dunes of dawn!
The child was alone
Wth the sleeping town in his throat.
A fountain that rises from dream
guarded him from thirsts of seaweed.
The child and his agony face to face,
Were two green entangled showers.
The child stretched on the ground
his agony bent on itself.
I want to descent the well,
I want to die my death by mouthfuls,
I want to fill my heart with moss,
To see the one wounded by water.
2.5k
Softness has no measure,
you would suppose,
but your eyes whisper
intimate love secrets, that I gather,
those gentle waves of softness
my eyes would finely record,
and my heart will resonate
tenderly with its every nuance.
Every look conceals alphabets of
softness, for the one intended,
as those eye lashes flutter, like a dove,
its exact measure, my mind captures,
This softness I receive and respond,
and you send moment by moment,
is the essence of passion we deeply share.
Your voice quivers, my heart jitters,
a stylus fashioned from thought,
will etch each word,
in our inner caves, for ever to remain.
Softness spreads in the air
when you are near;
from the lovely thoughts you bring,
it permeates defying all science,
conventions and understanding,
I swing in to high gear with love fever.
*Your touch; isn't it condensed softness?
with that flower soft touch, a new level of awareness
in love, comes in to being, I fly in the air,without wings!
yet my heart craves for your eyes' special interest,
won't you oblige?*
Oct 26, 2012
Oct 26, 2012 at 12:00 AM UTC
.
*One day at a time
swings the pendulum;
only love awakens senses
too ephemeral to be restrained,
like the magic of a phonograph stylus
in a vintage vinyl groove
and the sensual touch
of skin so new
It's not easy to watch
a flock flying away
in the distance,
seeing the expanse beyond
reach of a wandering mind;
heed distracted
by the slow sway
of the treetops hypnotic careen
Doves dive on feathered canter,
silent as the winged wind,
broke free from the gravity
befallen the weight
of the world
Looking up wondering
beyond the sky,
the passing clouds
crawl across
palliating the dusk hazed horizon
Synchronicity transcends across
an immeasurably deep river chasm,
into a wordless abyss
ensconced unthought
between
here and there
Silent silhouettes
glide across
the valley void below,
wings to the sky
and, if you listen to a moment breathe,
you can hear
the silent peace .............
you can feel the prevailing wind's direction
blowing through your soul*
Jesse Stillwater
December 2017
Jun 21, 2018
Jun 21, 2018 at 2:40 PM UTC
Moon drags her silver stylus—waves engrave sand.
Our bodies, hourglass, ride its sand.
Hungry tides carve sand.
Sighs press our secrets in the sand
Tidal pools whisper vows in sand,
then retreating waves unwrite sand.
Our love, rewritten as sand.
Dawn erases nothing.
Mar 24, 2025
Mar 24, 2025 at 7:08 PM UTC
‘What a piece of work is a man!’
……… ………
And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust’
From Shakespeare, through Hamlet
It rings down to generations
And falls heavily on my ears too
In vain, I attempt to probe into the mystery
Nay, the enigma called man
Both in the silence of my solitude
And in the learned circle of pundits
(Fool…..
Unable to find who you are
Can you venture to say who the other man is?)
Man is a jumble of contradictions,
I know….A hard nut to crack!
So unfathomable, so mysterious
At once a Satan and an angel
To the outer world I am someone
But in the well guarded cellars of my privacy
Aren’t I different?
Hiding my innards to light
As every other man
At times, I feel so proud
Excessively in love with my own image
Like Narcissus, the poor hunter boy
Fated by gods to languish
On the bank of a pond,
Over his own floating image!
However with all my strength within
Do I not feel as helpless as Prometheus bound?
Waiting for a Hercules to come
And save me from my plight
If Prometheus’ ******* was God willed
Mine is self willed…! Is the difference so very crucial?
Sometimes I feel I am Janus
Looking backward and forward
Into my past and my future
Never living in the present
Or am I more a Sisyphus
Eternally rolling a rock over to the hill
From where it keeps falling down
Sometimes I wonder
Amid the splendor, do I not starve?
Like Tantalus of Greece in the pool
Beneath the tree, with the low lying branches of fruits
Constantly eluding his grasp
And the water, ever receding before
He could take a drink!
As a poet how I wish I could
Equate myself with Calliope
Carving my mind on the wax tablet
With stylus, my pen and coloring it with my fancy
Or Orpheus, so skilled in music
That with my sad musings
I can make even Hades weep
And the rocks fall in line
I shudder to be a Medusa
Turning everyone to a stone
With my sinister glance!
Instead, I want to be one of the Graces
And never one among the Gorgons
Pitched in this gallery
Of queer mythological entities
I wonder how I appear to others
And whom I resemble more!
Oct 20, 2016
Oct 20, 2016 at 7:27 AM UTC
you were never an artist;
I'm sorry but it is true.
once, you sketched me
(sharpie on loose leaf, 2013)
and while I was touched by the gesture
[labor of love that it was]
it really looked more like your older brother.
now, your art is shared for mere
moments
(stylus on snapchat, 2014)
but you are still no artist.
you are an auteur, a lover, a curator,
finessing your homages to your youth
[pokemon, zelda, batman]
you may not be an artist
but I love you all the same.
Mar 4, 2014
Mar 4, 2014 at 11:22 AM UTC
Listen to that big band swing,
Jippin dat doo dattin, with Bing.
Twirl and dancing that vinyl black.
Feelin' the beat through the thumpin' bass crack.
Movin' digits like dancin. Dames.
Tease out that trumpet's pinching twang.
Her dress twirls through the floor,
She.
Spiraling blackhole, spiraling through time net curvatures wormhole.
My ears crash, jazzy spats, of floppin' bop, on the tendrils of brain,
The ooze in my ears feels drunk from the tune,
Music peers to the table cloths wine stain.
She's the toilet water of my music.
Oh that swing.
Oh!
THAT SWING.
I cant help but love that swing like, child's kiss.
Bringing me soft love in lime blues, cross jazz legs,
Spazzing with cigarette drags, dragging my nails through your chest,
Oh that swing, smears me through your dress.
Love child, those legs,
Beauty those pearly notes,
Prickling whites,
Shark teeth scratching the record,
Or just dust.
Slides________________________
Slides the tip of the stylus through divots,
In the pavement street of record.
Missive.
Don't turn that table too slow now.
That swing can't stop.
Oh that big band swing.
Beat that rhythm,
Boys...take it from the top.
Mar 29, 2013
Mar 29, 2013 at 9:55 PM UTC
She sings, unites beautiful melody with a naturally melodious language
The end result being how I don't have a clue what she's saying
chanting the mantra given to her
by the bearded sage in the terry cloth bathrobe
who told her "your mind is a vast field where elephants gather to play"
before conferring the mantra
She lets the Sanskrit words roll over her tongue
a vernacular of formidable power
effecting even those who don't speak a word
such was I, Sanskrit illiterate, but the repetition
opened the lotus flower of my heart
the baby blue visage of Sri Krishna materialized
from the words she was singing
I took away his flute and blew a line from an old Jethro Tull song
she thought it enchanting
but Krishna was not happy to see his vaunted woodwind in the hands of a mere mortal
he stepped up to me, polite as can be
he says "if you don't give me my instrument I will be forced to cut off your hands, and then what do you think will happen to this poem?"
I stood my ground, possession being two thirds of the law
I blew the flute solo from Genesis' "The Musical Box" (having known it by heart)
the blue boy asked several times for me to
give him that almighty flute
each time I told him "No! You'll have it soon enough"
apparently not soon enough
(For he felt a pair of garden shears slice firmly through his right hand
the same set of shears severed his left
he dropped his stylus and papyrus to the ground
toppled over, landing smashly with a great crash
within a matter of time he bled out from the stumps where his hands had once been attached
Krishna picked up his flute and said
"what a pity"
and vanished into thin air
it all ended quickly as it had begun
and the sweet lady never stopped chanting her mantra
in fact her back had been turned before Krishna even showed up
it was a great shock to find her gentleman friend's lifeless and handless body on the ground
She shed a tear
I was no less miserable and sad
wished above all else
that I had been a real poet
so I could have finished the man's life work)
Aug 29, 2016
Aug 29, 2016 at 5:21 PM UTC
Pencil and paper turn into stylus and screen;
our world is industrializing like we've never seen.
Manufacturing products out left and right,
and soon enough our prototypes will join in the fight.
Are we possibly producing more than we can consume?
Do we understand that technology could lead to our doom?
Convenient, oh sure, as we just sit here and get fat.
We have iPhones, and iPads, but no eye contact?
The air is getting dirtier and unhealthier per day,
and we believe the government when they say it's okay.
Do we not realize how much harm we're actually doing,
even though a better world is what we're pursuing?
Apr 29, 2016
Apr 29, 2016 at 12:04 PM UTC
When I read, I speak,
And when I speak, I read
Words rolling off my eyes,
Filling my tongue full of free--
Style rhyming and rhythm.
The canons of thought rolling out with a boom.
Pachelbel changing your direction of flow
Through some Perverse, Obscure, Rehearsal
Suddenly Reversed.
Back where you started,
Starting over again,
With a pen in your hand
The words crowding your head.
Gotta jump and tumble
To the jiggle and flow
Of the individualistic,
Unrealistic,
Even cannibalistic
Creations that grow.
From your stylus,
Rife.
Words.
They're the stuff of life.
Feb 22, 2011
Feb 22, 2011 at 7:47 PM UTC
Miss G puts on Chopin
the old record player's
seen better days
one can tell
by the stylus
and the way
Miss G's finger
lifts its down
on the record
I sit at the back
of the class
with a kid named Rennie
Yochana 's at the front
with the blonde girl
-Yochana's dark hair
at shoulder length-
her fingers
pretend playing
on the desktop
her slim body
moving side to side
in the open backed chair
old tit-less thinks
she the pianist
Rennie darkly says
I'm already watching
her hands going cross
in front of her
side to side
and her slim body
captured in my inner
eye and out
and secretly
I blow kisses
at her
when no one's about.
Jun 27, 2015
Jun 27, 2015 at 2:51 AM UTC
They took them…
With a *** shovel and beards engulfed with disguise,
By fire, by force and harm
They heartlessly took them…
Loading with a military van from the snare, the school
Sabotaging their education and jubilance
At the brink of our oculus, like a hot blade through margarine,
Like the evanescence of dew upon new dawn,
They were gone…
We cajole to Haram Islamic militants,
Not the slavery we signed up for,
Yet this is our story, but not our destiny.
It is profane and sacrilegious to talk slavery upon our realms.
Our ancestral dormancy and Jesus crucifixion outlines our history.
We were untrammeled...but today,
Our existence is dreary and clouded by mystery
We count minutes turning into tormented hours,
In lament of our own flesh and blood
They took them..
with needles and stylus they pinched poked and taunted us,
Like a bunch of sponges filled with voids,
Our hearts are painfully porous,
Dope them with defects,
Bring back our girls…
Haram saboteurs came in with a saber,
They took them…
How less of a man to not respect the words of the late Tata Madiba,
When he said"Never, never and never again shall it be that this beautiful land
Will again experience the oppression of one by another".
There will be war upon the element of Haram when Jesus intervene..
Bring back our girls..
(Nigreian acsent)
Chinekeee, man of Haram, bring back our girls_oo
I beg, why go they take?
Eeeh, god will go get you one day,
With our teary Nigerian eyes, will we ever see?
Adedagbo, our crown of joy ?
Aduke, our beloved ?
Afolayan Walking in majesty...
Agbogu, God settles dispute…
Bring back our girls.
Aug 25, 2014
Aug 25, 2014 at 1:28 AM UTC
as one stage empties
slow shuffle exit
another curtain will
rise
waiting for that spark
an instant in time
silent explosion
within
stylus on rock face
outline of past forms
a mountain's sudden
call
as eagle marks
still moments
above a darkened
gorge
brooding dawn
fights clouds'
urgent
cries
and man's spirit
lifts high and
at last
flies
free
- - - - - -
Dec 2, 2016
Dec 2, 2016 at 2:42 PM UTC
The stylus is more potent than the dirk they say
You don't fail to make a mark even when picked up by a dilettante everyday
Esoteric idioms your masters make you write
While the poignant sentences you write come only late in the night
Someday you are in the hands of the who's who of the town
The other days you spend in the hands of a clown
You come clad in plastic,platinum,silver and gold
With different coloured lifelines-blue,black,red,green and pink
And a plethora of stories you keep clandestine and untold
A travesty you make of the fools and to the prudent you make think
With every word you write, you pant for breath
And when your heart stops beating, they mark it as your death(end of a refill)
You can be cryptic, there's no one stopping
You can be acerbic even with beauty on the outside(the beauty of the letters)
From the Treaty of Versailles to the varied pompous constitutions penned, you've always left me shocking
Blessed be the hands that cradle you and take the ride(ride of the writing)
You take them through the best roller-coaster journey of words
Bringing out the inexplicable happiness be it just the lyre of the birds
A predilection i have for you, for you engender the best in me
I know I'd always have you in the middle of a dark chilled night come what may be
Its you whom i turn to with my querulous platitudes
And you furnish me the answers with a benevolent smile and gratitude
Its you who defines me, for i am nothing but an amorphous mould
Still learning when to be bold and when to feel cold.
Dec 20, 2013
Dec 20, 2013 at 2:00 PM UTC
Whether on stone or wood, slate or leather,
Papyrus, parchment, vellum or paper,
With fingers or stylus, chalk or the quill,
Much later with the pen or the pencil,
Or the typewriter, computers today;
Writers, to write, will always find a way.
Jan 24, 2017
Jan 24, 2017 at 6:27 AM UTC
"I watched a snail crawl along the edge of a straight razor.
That's my dream. It's my nightmare. Crawling, slithering,
along the edge of a straight razor … and surviving."
– Col. Kurtz, Apocalypse Now
~
Remember
the golden age, Wally ***
And the songs
my mother taught me?
We sang about what was.
Or might never be.
Like permanency.
Distinction comes
out of stiff and frozen silences.
Take it with
a spoonful of disdain.
Take it in the eye.
Actors are like breakfast cereals.
They're obvious
and according to taste.
I stopped needing them
long ago.
Beautiful
Tallulah.
Beautiful,
"less to this than
meets the eye"
Tallulah,
dismiss me,
that I may be free
to find Tennessee.
Open windows
and closing doors.
Always a breeze,
but never a way out.
Right on cue
the cards shuffle.
Butter and cotton *****
tricks of the trade.
I mumble to be heard.
I am legend
to disciples
of the Method.
I wear my friends to bed,
burn them like newspaper.
They call me "Bud"
—cigarettes at dawn
after devouring the night.
And now my song ebbs,
as the stylus hits the leadout groove.
Tomorrow, I'll be better.
Today, I'm just me.
Jan 8, 2021
Jan 8, 2021 at 11:04 AM UTC
My life looks like my handwriting
Sloppy
Messy
Barely legible
Your love for me is calligraphy
A fluid movement of the heart
A cursive caress
A swift swoop of your stylus
My anger is stenciled onto me
In big block letters
Up and down both arms burning
To a furious fire in my hands
Your laughter uplifts me
An entire alphabet sings within it
It's another language
Filled with well wished words of wisdom
My sadness speaks to me
It's become my best friend
Whispering softly in my ear
That something has gone terribly wrong here
What I've worried about all along has now arrived
Your beauty is deafening
It came at me yelling and screaming
In an uproar that made me feel ugly
An unparalleled audible pretty
Before the silence muted me
You said everything I could ever ask for in a muse
I believe you can help my hurt
By leading by example
Showing and teaching me
The hand gestures of a happy life
The signs to communicate love
A beautiful return of sounds
A loud anger and
Sadness barrier breaker
Taking them away
When I hear this song and
My nothing becomes something
Then I will talk and hear again
Apr 30, 2013
Apr 30, 2013 at 4:46 PM UTC
your metre blackens the page
beautifully dancing fonts
caress the delicate surface
like skaters tracing their dance
across the ice in blades
an expression of genius perhaps
your gorgeous muse laughs
joyously titillating imagination
positively prostituting herself
to your phallus stylus ***********
your fertile imagination
spawning verse birthing phrase
and I don’t understand
a single ******* thing you said
Mar 23, 2022
Mar 23, 2022 at 6:44 PM UTC
Ink wounds sketched on her wrist
Prophetess unfurled her diamond proboscis
Hungrily ******* the pollen muse from the lyrist flower
She bounces her piety on the edge of her eyelids
Her azoic eyes flashing
Like a chrome apochromatic
Phonetic voice spinning a tune
Stylus fingertips dancing on a spinel canvas
Outlined on her metal stomach
Though eccentric
She is sterilized with intelligence
Tilting diagonally on insanities thin line
She is straitlaced
Self absorbed
Cryogenic
With upside down crosses imprinted on her throat
While her proselytes unthread dreams
From her coliseum heart
Bowing down to the collage God
Sacrificing sacrifices
“Pull more, pull more!”
Proselytes cried
Sunbeams painting their ash faces
As they pulled more dreams
From between the Prophetess lashes
Her hips becoming a petal chakra
Her vertebrae evaporating into bone butterflies
Fragments of every churchy elements
Pinning themselves to her skin
Her leather wings flapping a nursery rhyme
She spins out of control
Her musical clavicles creating a glassy chemical
Which shimmer and shake
Tattooing her pearl bones
Infusing her thoughts
She grafts herself on the minds
Of her Proselytes
They worshipped her life
They worshipped her body
They fed on her lies
Until one day
Error religion snatched her out her skin
Turned her into sacral fiber
Planted her whispers deep in a field of shredded dreams
And stretched her moon soul
Across the sun stained sky
For all to see
Her star spangled faith
Misshapen into unbelief
She had become her own religion
Her own personal god
But without any meaning
Sep 18, 2014
Sep 18, 2014 at 5:01 AM UTC
Will anyone look for that One Alone?
When this book on loan
has been returned
to the Library of Lamps as all its oil is burned?
When the waves retreating
have finished erasing
the messages I whispered
those etched with sobs unhindered
on the sands seemingly numbed
on the seashore of your heart succumbed?
Will anybody wonder what’s going on?
The nameplate’s gone
on the face of the closed door
of that room on the upper floor
that a while ago was Altar of Magnum Opus
of the tiring writer’s stylus
and Tabernacle
of a cramped leg muscle
of that voice that preached Darwin’s epistle.
The gong’s now muted
Just yesterday it was calling unrelented
upon fellow believers demented
The sun now starts to peep
As stars bid goodnight to sleep
The frail shadow shall lay down, no scent of frankincense
in the tomb of forgotten replies, with reminiscence -
of a hundred “wait till tomorrow” in any sense,
a thousand “just a minute” in any tense
“see yah later”, for a thousand “Whens?”
“soon . . .”, and now just silence . . .
Life leaves a million lessons.
and yes, I, we, will always remember . . .
Jan 2, 2018
Jan 2, 2018 at 3:29 AM UTC
where is the note
I long to hear
the one that echoes
freedom
life
insects, birds
maddening sharp
should be solace
stylus cruel
when armour's slipped
no safety's found
each breath is work
to think impacts
audacious sun
attempts to smile
through winter's hold
reprieve to none
Jun 7, 2017
Jun 7, 2017 at 6:54 PM UTC
I knew something was strange,
that it was going to be a weird day
when I saw the jellyfish
floating in clear blue skies,
Yoda sitting sideways
on my white picket fence.
The post man with electric rat eyes
actually snickered
when I signed
for the manila envelope
covered in white powder.
I’m not really sure
why he acted so comedic,
maybe he thought
it was a biological weapon.
But for all he knew
it could have been
something Peruvian.
After all, there is a rumor going around
about the ruling government,
it’s been said they keep spraying LSD
using jet engine contrails,
that it’s something about mind control.
That’s very similar
to what the Beatles
did with Revolution #9.
And, if you don’t believe me friends,
just play it backwards on your turntable,
you’ll hear the mythological devils
singing gibberish on
a diamond-tipped stylus.
I told you it was
a strange & weird day.
Feb 25, 2014
Feb 25, 2014 at 2:04 PM UTC
Needle poised, quiet stakes its claim—
groove’s canyon hums our throat’s refrain.
Hips align to revolutions’ frame,
stylus thirsts for our track unnamed.
Crackle swells like held-breath air,
pulsing bassline where silences pair.
Bridge unwinds—our bodies dare
to etch new music spinning there.
May 20, 2025
May 20, 2025 at 10:14 AM UTC